Lloyd Berry Movies

Filmed under the title Breeders, the made-for-cable thriller Brother's Keeper concentrated on, as the print ads so delicately described it, "A serial killer -- a fallen cop." Throughout her life, Lucinda Pond (Jeanne Tripplehorn) has looked after and protected her younger brother Ellis (Corin Nemec), whose aberrant mental state was the result of constant abuse at the hands of his father (Brian Jensen). As an adult, Lucinda worked as a criminal investigator, while Ellis pursued a criminal career. Despite this, Lucinda continued to shelter her brother, carefully covering up for his many crimes. Fired for bungling the investigation of alleged serial killer Victor Orbin, Lucinda opens up a boat and tackle store at a remote lakeside community. Local homicide detective Travis Adler (Leland Orser) invites Lucinda to participate in another murder investigation, this one apparently perpetrated by the same killer who indirectly cost Lucinda her badge. At the same time, Ellis escapes from jail and goes off on a homicidal spree of his own, eliminating those whom he feels did his sister wrong, as well as a few abusive parents along the way. Gradually, Lucinda begins to deduce a connection between Ellis' escape and her current investigation -- but will she continue to protect her kid brother despite his murderous rampage? Brother's Keeper made its USA Network bow on January 29, 2002; it was supposed to have premiered as My Brother's Keeper, but this title was changed at the last minute to avoid confusion with the like-vintage CBS TV-movie My Sister's Keeper. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

After parodying the blaxploitation films of the 1970s in I'm Gonna Git You Sucka, Keenen Ivory Wayans takes aim at slasher films of the 1980s and 1990s in this raunchy satire, which was produced under the clumsy but inarguably appropriate title Scream If You Know What I Did Last Halloween. As you might expect, a group of teenagers -- not-terribly-bright Buffy (Shannon Elizabeth), her best friend Brenda (Regina Hall), stoner Shorty (Marlon Wayans), fey football player Ray (Shawn Wayans), loudmouthed Greg (Lochlyn Munro), sexually overexcited Bobby (Jon Abrahams), and his prim girlfriend Cindy (Anna Faris) -- are on the run from a maniacal killer who is looking for revenge after the kids accidentally kill a man following an auto accident. They also find themselves having to contend with intrusive reporter Gail Hailstorm (Cheri Oteri) and eccentric high school principal Squiggly (David L. Lander). Incidentally, the title Scary Movie is something of an inside joke: it was the working title for Scream, the movie that kick-started the mid-'90s slasher film revival. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Jumanji is a visually elaborate fantasy about an enchanted board game that opens a magical portal to a jungle universe. Two young children, Judy (Kirsten Dunst) and Peter (Bradley Pierce), discover the game in an abandoned home and suddenly are greeted by Alan (Robin Williams), an adult who has spent his life trapped inside the game since playing it at age 12. Alan's only hope for freedom involves finishing the game, but this proves rather dangerous, as Judy, Peter, and Alan find themselves running for their lives from huge rhinoceroses, evil monkeys, vicious lions, and other terrifying jungle beasts. Director Joe Johnston, whose special-effects background previously came to good use in Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, used groundbreaking computer imagery to simulate the thrills. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

The tragic wreck of the super-tanker Exxon Valdez in Prince William Sound, Alaska on March 24, 1989 was one of the most devastating ecological disasters in recent history. Immediately after the ship ran aground and began pumping over 11 million gallons of suffocating oil from its ruptured hold, experts were sent out to assess the damage and clean up the mess. This gripping docudrama tells their story. Much centers on the conflict between local officials, the fishing industry, and the Exxon official sent out to oversee the clean-up and take the rap. With unflinching moral outrage, the filmmakers point out that much of the aftermath could have been minimized had the officials in charge been better prepared and not spent so much time involved in useless red-tape and petty bureaucratic bickering. Most of the film was shot in Vancouver, British Columbia, but it also utilizes archival filmclips of the actual disaster and clean up efforts. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Though John Badham's Stakeout doesn't flinch in the violence department, the film concentrates primarily on characterization. Richard Dreyfuss and Emilio Estevez play a pair of Seattle detectives, assigned to capture escaped hood Aidan Quinn. The twosome spends much of the film on stakeout in a lonely, deserted house; the object of their scrutiny is Madeline Stowe, Quinn's former girlfriend. Pretending to be a telephone repairman, Dreyfuss plants a bug in Stowe's apartment--thereby inaugurating a romance that compromises the detective's objectivity. In the climax, Quinn gets the upper hand--at least until the fists start flying. Perfect as it stood, Stakeout didn't need to be elaborated upon with a sequel, but Another Stakeout was produced all the same. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Aimed primarily at the television audience, this somewhat predictable prison drama centers on Danny Baker (Winston Rekert), a lifer put into solitary confinement. Though shut off from most of the outside world, Baker supplies needed information to Joan Tremblay (Andrée Pelletier) in her fight against the practice of isolating prisoners for long periods of time. After Danny is released from solitary, he is falsely accused of having drugs and is about to be sent back to the same confinement. Threatened, he and a few others take Tremblay hostage to protest the use of solitary as punishment -- a risk that does not bode well for anyone concerned. The stereotyped dialogue in this uneven film is set against some gruesome prison scenes, meant to underscore the inhumanity of prison conditions in general. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A reclusive, unhappy gold magnate finds his isolated tropical paradise threatened by the intrusion of organized criminals in director Nicolas Roeg's convoluted, arty drama. Gene Hackman stars as Jack McCann, a one-time gold prospector who his parlayed the discovery of a rich deposit in the Canadian wilderness into an immense fortune. Instead of satisfaction, McCann's wealth leads to depression and paranoia, and he moves to a remote island and withdraws from the world. The bulk of the film centers on what has become of McCann some thirty years later, as he attempts to deal with a troubled daughter (Theresa Russell) and the attentions of the Mafia, who want to build a new casino on his tropical home. As the pressures increase, his efforts to protect his property and maintain his family become increasingly desperate, culminating in an extended public trial. Even stranger and more stylized than most of Roeg's work, the disjointed Eureka will seem incomprehensible and painfully pretentious to those with little patience for his indirect narratives and purposefully exaggerated approach. Devoted fans, however, will find further proof of the director's impressive visual sense, especially during the film's earlier sequences. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

A spinster goes to extraordinary lengths to assuage her loneliness in Robert Altman's 1969 drama. Wealthy Frances Austen (Sandy Dennis) conducts herself as if she were older than she actually is, but when she spies a blond youth (Michael Burns) sitting alone in a rain-swept Vancouver park, she takes him to her apartment. Apparently mute, the boy accepts Frances's ministrations, content to have a bed of his own and to listen to her talk, even if he has to come and go through his window after she locks his bedroom door at night. But when he leaves his bed empty on the night that Frances attempts to seduce him, the boy soon learns who is in control of their relationship and how far Frances will go to keep it that way. This film began Altman's 1970s effort to experiment with established movie genres: in this case, the Gothic thriller. Making the most of Frances's creepy apartment, cinematographer Laszlo Kovacs zooms in to symbolic details of Frances's life and zooms out to reveal her unnerving isolation in her own space. Altman maintains an awareness of the world outside Frances and the boy through mobile visuals and snippets of other conversations whenever either is in public, signaling the emphasis on the periphery that marked his future films, while underlining Frances's and the boy's estrangement from "normal" life. Too odd, distant and, well, cold, That Cold Day in the Park flopped. Producer Ingo Preminger claimed that if he had seen That Cold Day in the Park, he never would have hired Altman to direct his next film: the 1970 smash hit MASH. ~ Lucia Bozzola, All Movie Guide